2011年7月26日
By 1月时特约编辑
专题文章

谷歌的WebM专利之战即将打响?

今年2月，MPEG LA宣布了一项 call for patents essential to the VP8 video codec specification 正如Google的WebM发布中概述的那样. The press release announcing the call asked for submissions by March 18, so I thought I would check in with a spokesperson at MPEG-LA to see if there was any activity.

我知道有很多. Twelve parties have stepped forward with patents that they believe are essential to the VP8 standard, 谷歌的WebM就是基于它的, though no patent pool has been formed yet and MPEG LA is not releasing the patentholders' names at this time.

I sent questions to MPEG LA via email; below are the organization's responses.

流媒体: Have their been any submissions relating to the VP8 call to patents that you announced in February?

MPEG LA:是的.

这些提交会发生什么? The press release talks about submitting the patents for “a determination of their essentiality by MPEG LA’s patent evaluators.” Can you explain what that is and how good a predictor this analysis is if you ever have to go to court to prove infringement?

A "determination of their essentiality by MPEG LA’s patent evaluators" means that patent experts, 依照专利法解释专利权利要求书, compare claims of the submitted patents to the VP8 Specification to determine whether one or more independent claims is essential to the VP8 Specification. Patents with a claim that is found to be essential to the VP8 Specification may be included in a VP8 patent pool license should one be formed. Patents that are determined not to be essential would not be included in a VP8 patent pool license. Independent evaluations of patent essentiality are key to MPEG LA’s pool licensing programs and have stood up well throughout its history.

Assuming that you've received a patent or patents that is/are deemed essential, what happens next?

Those patent holders found to have at least one essential patent were invited to discuss and determine the possible creation of a pool license and the terms of any such license. Thus far, 12 parties have been found to have patents essential to the VP8 standard. 一般, parties may submit patents for evaluation of essentiality to VP8 at any time during the process of facilitating a patent pool, 并可能在泳池启动后继续这样做, 假设形成了一个.

创建池许可证后, it typically remains open for the inclusion of additional essential patents, and patent holders with essential patents are welcome to join the license as Licensors. MPEG LA met with VP8 essential patent holders in late June to facilitate a discussion among them whether and on what terms they may want to create a VP8 patent pool license and is continuing to facilitate that discussion.

What’s the statue of limitations (or analog) to claims like these? Is there any date where you have to either sue or get off the pot?

创建专利池license时, it is offered as a convenience to the market enabling users to take a license to as much essential intellectual property as possible in a single license as an alternative to negotiating separate licenses with individual patent owners. Decisions whether to bring actions for infringement of patents are made by individual patent owners.

那么这一切意味着什么呢? My take is this: The bottom line is that there are some patent holders with claims that VP8 infringes upon their IP rights, 但是这个专利组织还没有成立. 我没有参与任何讨论, but I would assume that one very salient factor regarding whether to form a group is the likelihood of prevailing against Google if a patent infringement suit was filed, 还有那套衣服的估计成本.

在花费1.05亿美元获得这项技术之后, it’s unlikely that Google wouldn’t fight any infringement claims, and legal fees that would seem monumental to most companies would be remote rounding errors for Google. 有时600磅重的大猩猩不战而胜.

Speaking of Google, we asked if they had any comment on this story. 以下是我们从谷歌发言人那里得到的声明, a very slight variation on a statement the company first issued in March:

“MPEG LA has alluded to a VP8 pool since WebM launched—this is nothing new. 打开web成功, 社区开发的创新, and the WebM Project brings the same principles to web video. The vast majority of the industry supports free and open development, which is why we formed the CCL WebM enabling member organizations to license patents they may have that are essential to WebM technologies to other members of the CCL. We are firmly committed to the project and establishing an open codec for HTML5 video.”